1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle surroundings monitoring apparatus for detecting a preceding vehicle existing ahead of an own vehicle from traveling circumstances in front of the own vehicle detected by a stereoscopic camera, a monocular camera, a millimeter wave radar, and the like and to a traveling control system incorporating such vehicle surroundings monitoring apparatus.
2. Discussion of Related Arts
In recent years, such a traveling control system as detecting traveling circumstances by a camera and the like mounted on a vehicle, recognizing a preceding vehicle from the traveling circumstances data and making a control to follow up the preceding vehicle or to keep an intervehicle distance between the own vehicle and the preceding vehicle, has been put into practical use.
For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. Toku-Kai 2000-137900 discloses a technology in which a preceding vehicle is judged from the relationship between a present lateral position and an estimated lateral position of a solid object at an own lane region and the intervehicle distance control or the issuance of warning are performed in a manner similar to drivers' driving senses.
However, the disadvantage of the prior art is that since the judgment of a preceding vehicle is dependent upon the estimated lateral position of a solid object at the own lane region, if the estimation differs, the detection of the preceding vehicle may fail. Further, according to the prior art, since the intervehicle distance control or the issuance of warning is made based on the judgment whether the detected object is a preceding vehicle or not, for instance, in case where a vehicle comes in and out the own lane, a smooth detection of the preceding vehicle is hindered.